


And After All This Time

by voodoochild



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Comment Fic, M/M, Retirement, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-15
Updated: 2010-09-15
Packaged: 2017-10-11 20:39:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/116866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voodoochild/pseuds/voodoochild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Retirement's better the second time around. Unfortunately, it's different when you're facing it for the first time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And After All This Time

**Author's Note:**

> Written for **empressnan** in the iTunes playlist challenge. Title and quote from the Smiths' "The Boy With the Thorn in His Side".
> 
> Disclaimer: I have no earthly idea what Hunter and Steph named their third daughter, so the name in here is made up. As is the entire scenario, since I don't own anyone and have no connection to WWE, Titan Sports, or anyone with the name McMahon.

_And when you want to live, how do you start?_

*****

Retirement is better the second time around.

It's his choice this time - well, his with a big helping of Rebecca's tactful "I worry about you wrestling too much longer" - and there are no life-changing back surgeries to worry about. This time, he has his wife and children to be thankful for. This time, he's got friends who don't just call him up to make sure he hasn't overdosed. He's not angry about being forced out of his job, and he doesn't have any controversies hanging over his head.

It's only hard the first couple weeks. It's the sucker-punch to the stomach the first time he turns on Raw and he's not in it. It's the ache he gets the first time he works out for no reason, the guilt the first time he makes one of Cheyenne's dance recitals. And it takes about a month before he stops packing his bags every Sunday night, looking for plane tickets he doesn't have.

After that, it's easier. Life is simple; wake up, thank God for a new day, be a husband and father, teach at Cornerstone, go to bed. Learn how to be "just Shawn" again. The business hasn't gone away, but it's nowhere near as immediate. His connection starts and stops when he watches Raw and Impact, and he's just a fan like any other.

Who's next, who's jobbing to who, what the next big feud is? All the office bullshit that seems so important when you're in the middle of it? It's not any of his concern any longer.

He keeps in touch with the boys, of course. Ric calls him when he joins TNA, wants his blessing and gets it. Scotty calls, and Shawn listens as Scotty shapes up, then falls down again, and he listens when Scotty finally tells him he's going to Vince and cashing in the offer for rehab. Kevin calls to complain about Scott and complain about Kid and pretend he isn't having the time of his life. And it's not just the Kliq; Shawn's talked John through his marriage problems and Randy through the first-child panicking and Dave through the heel-turn slump.

But it's actually Cameron who notices, wants to know why Uncle Paul isn't coming for his graduation from elementary school.

He and Hunter haven't talked - not really talked - since that last night. It still hurts to see Hunter on TV every week, watch him do what he does best, and know it'll never be like it was. When Hunter goes in for surgery, Shawn calls, of course he calls. He gets a royal lecture from Steph and an indignant one from Aurora (who is every inch her mother's daughter, with Hunt's eyes and impish smirk).

There are a few phone calls, Stamford to San Antonio, every month. Shawn pretends he isn't pumping Hunter for information and Hunter pretends he doesn't want to guilt-trip Shawn into coming back in some capacity. They both pretend they're not wishing for four years ago, when they were riding the DX high and having the time of their lives.

When Nicole is born, he's on the phone to Hunter two hours later. It's one am in Texas, three on the East Coast, but he's stretched out on the couch on his cell anyway, teasing Hunter and bribing his way into godfather - c'mon, Shane and Kevin got the first two, he has to be next in line, right?

He doesn't expect Hunter to ask him, but he does.

"Come up to Connecticut, Shawn, please. We'd - I'd really like to see you."

He flies out on Saturday, Shane picks him up from the airport and won't tell him a thing about what he's doing now, just that it's not wrestling or politics and he's happy. Shane won't talk about Hunter, either, only mentions briefly that Hunter's three months behind on his back rehab. Which is Shane's way of warning Shawn about it, and telling Shawn that he's worried.

When he gets to the McMahon-Levesque compound, he gets bombarded with women: Nicole is beautiful and she's going to be even more of a heartbreaker than her sisters; Stephanie's still exhausted, but worried about her husband, too; Aurora is grumpy because no one's paying attention to her and Murphy doesn't care because she gets to hang out with Grandma Linda, who has the press hounding her every move and she's about to set fire to the next photographer she finds.

It's the complete opposite of San Antonio's calm, and he doesn't mind one bit, but it's Hunter he needs to go see.

Hunter's escaped down to the gym, and Shawn can hear the telltale clanging of weights and extensive cursing that says he's doing reps. He reaches the bottom of the stairs, and oh God. It's like the past five months never happened; Hunter in workout clothes, hair in a ponytail, rehab beard in full mode. He looks amazing, but of course, in Shawn's opinion, he always looks amazing.

"You're slacking off, hotshot," he says, leaning against the leg press and watching as Hunter benches 250. "You did 275 every day in Birmingham."

Hunter pounds out a rep, then looks up. "This isn't Birmingham, Shawnie. Not fucking close."

He didn't come here to fight, and holds his hands up. "Hey, watch it with the language. You want Rory picking that up?"

"Course not," Hunter says, counting down 50, 49, 48... and Shawn moves around to spot him. Dumbass absolutely would knock himself on the head with a barbell after spending upwards of ten years being a paragon of weightlifting safety. "Not when she's learning fluent swearing from Kevin."

Shawn has to smile. Rebecca had forbidden Kevin and Scott from teaching the kids anything after Cheyenne picked up "sumbitch". He's lucky it wasn't anything more serious.

Hunter finishes the last set, and Shawn helps him guide the barbell back onto the rack. Hunt's skin is clammy, muscles visibly trembling, and he won't look at Shawn as he sits up and dries off with a towel.

"How long have you been hiding down here?" Shawn asks.

"About three reps too long," Hunter mutters, setting the towel down and standing up. Shawn itches to reach out, pull him into a hug, but he can't. Hunt's in that mood of his, where he'll swing blind at pretty much anyone. "I just - fuck, Shawn."

Shawn does reach out, now, because he knows this look. The "I'm crap at this, help me out here" look. And wraps his arms tight around Hunter, like coming home.

"How long, Hunt?" he asks again.

Hunter's head is buried in his neck, but he's never really needed to hear Hunter to know what he's saying. "Since the surgery. Since I started wondering if I really want to come back."

Oh. That does explain things, and Shawn can't say he's unfamiliar with the question: is it worth it? Is the adrenaline rush and the pop from the crowd going to be worth the pain it's going to take? It's what you ask yourself after every injury, eventually. When you're young, the answer's easy. _Yes, yes, of course yes_ and you train like a demon to get back. When you're older, sometimes the answer just isn't there.

When you start realizing there's more reasons not to come back, it's time to hang it up, and Hunter knows that.

"You'll know when it's time," Shawn says, breathing in sweat and deodorant and whatever ridiculous scent the dry-cleaner uses on Hunter's clothes.

"Like you did?" The subject is still painful, scraping at his heart. He left. Hunter still misses him. "You and Mark, sold-out crowd in Phoenix. Wrestle-fucking-mania. Nothing better than that."

"Yeah. Blaze of glory, remember? It was how I wanted it to be."

That's how they've always wanted to go out. Shawn got his wish. Hunter needs to realize that he can say _no, it's time_ \- but he won't. Like Ric, Hunter will probably have to be carried away in a casket from the business.

Hunter lets him go, though they're still holding each other's arms. Shawn's is tanned from the long Texas summer, Hunter hasn't been to the salon in ages and is rehab-pale, and Shawn can remember being stretched out in motel rooms when it was the other way around. Remembers Hunter's skin tanned and toned, his own almost ghostly pale, Hunter calling him "Casper" and tackling him for it.

One look tells him Hunter's remembering, too. Hunter ducks his head, kisses him quick and soft, squeezing his shoulder.

"Not how I wanted it. I should've told you."

He doesn't need to say it. He never did.

 _I'm sorry. I love you. I always have._


End file.
